You may not like guns, or you may think they’re just the thing to keep everyone safe. One thing that almost everyone can agree on is that the illegal black-market sale of guns poses a serious problem for society. Felons, prohibited from purchasing legal firearms often turn to the black-market for unregulated weapons. One should expect a senator known for his anti-gun positions to at least be consistent in opposing both legal and illegal guns. That’s not the case, however, with Senator Leland Yee (D-San Francisco), who was recently charged with corruption and trafficking illegal guns.

It seems that the California state senator with outspoken views about guns, only has a problem with legal guns, not illegal ones. Legal guns, it serves to reason, cut into his black-market trade of unregulated, illegal guns.

Yee was arrested on Wednesday, booked and charged with illegally trafficking in firearms as well as multiple counts of public corruption. A total of 26 others were charged in relation to his arrest, with crimes ranging from drug smuggling to murder-for-hire.

Back in 2012, Yee told CBS in an interview that he wanted guns like AR-15s and magazines with more than 10 round capacities off the streets. Ironically, he had no problem putting these guns back on the streets illegally, unregistered and unregulated.

“This is not an easy issue. But I am a father, and I want our communities to be safe, and god forbid if one of these weapons fell into the wrong hands.”

What Yee apparently considered the “wrong hands” were hands that didn’t funnel black-market money from illegal assault weapon sales back to him.

Yee could face up to 20 years in prison as well as a $250,000 fine for each corruption charge. The gun trafficking count could result in five years in prison and a similar fine, ironically a less severe sentence than California would hand down if someone brought in a weapon on their banned list, from a neighboring state.

All of this is disturbingly reminiscent of the so-called “war on drugs”, and the opposition of politicians to legal, regulated drugs, in favor of black-market pay-offs. Is something like this at work when it comes to gun policies and politicking in the U.S.? It’s hard to say across the board, but whatever you think about guns – good or bad – this disparity between sentences makes you wonder who these laws are targeting and who they are protecting.